


Space With You

by owlsshadows



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Space, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Confessions, Drabble, Goodbyes, M/M, Space Husbands, Spaceships, a prominent role goes for a black hole, because i can't harm my precious boys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-07
Updated: 2018-08-07
Packaged: 2019-06-23 07:03:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15600909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/owlsshadows/pseuds/owlsshadows
Summary: They knew it was a suicide mission from the beginning – outer space explorers got lost more often than have returned – but exactly this was what drew Tanaka so much towards it. He could navigate through uncharted meteor fields for a reason. He was born to do this.When Exploration Team Karasuno II faces imminent death, Tanaka decides to ask the question that has been bugging him for the longest of time.Written for EnnoTana Week 2018, Day 6, for the prompts: Sci-fi ☆ Purple ☆ Adulthood





	Space With You

**EnnoTana Day 6 prompts:**   ** _Sci-fi_** ☆ **_Purple_** ☆ **_Adulthood_**

 

“She was cute,” starts Ennoshita, and his voice cuts the silence as a knife would cut the left ventricle of Tanaka’s heart.

“Sure she was,” Tanaka murmurs in reply.

His thoughts, bottled up and kept hidden deep inside, spurt out as blood would through an open wound. It’s not the lack of oxygen, but his own feelings, that suffocates him. Strapped in his seat, so close yet just out of reach, he casts his glance away from his friend. On the black cloth of endless, vast space, their spaceship seems to be a hint of salt, scattered white scraps of metal and plexi.

Far out in unknown galaxy, the two-member crew of exploration mission Karasuno II floats aimlessly in their escape pod, watching helpless as their ship falls apart and crumbles under the pressure of the black hole. They had the luck to evacuate before the pull of the hole engulfed them too – at the expanse of being trapped inside their pod, with limited air and water, far from any known star or space base.

From one surefire death to the other.

They knew it was a suicide mission from the beginning – outer space explorers got lost more often than have returned – but exactly this was what drew Tanaka so much towards it.

He was an excellent pilot, best in his year. He could have done so many – become military and fly those giant battleships, or sign with the biggest of trade companies and spend the rest of his life transferring goods from one base to the other. He could even be the private driver of one of those moguls who built entire colonies as pastime – his reflexes and mental fortitude made him popular with the entire association, he could have gotten the best recommendations.

Yet he chose the life of the wild ones; the one where death is always an imminent threat, because once the body of a ship is injured, air slips out in an instant, because space is a cold, merciless and empty bitch of a place – because ever since he was a child, he fell in love with the stars, and the word discovery could send chills down his spine. He could navigate through uncharted meteor fields for a reason. He was born to do this. He was a born explorer. He signed up for the outer space explorers as soon as he reached legal age.

His companion on the other hand happens to be a strange case. Ennoshita Chikara is a scientist. A no-nonsense, down-to-earth, grumpy researcher, who has never in their ten years of friendship mentioned his willingness, let alone enthusiasm to go into deep space. He has just… never seemed to be the type to risk his life, no matter how eager he was for knowledge. He was the inventor type from the beginning, the man who creates, rather than finds. What surprises Tanaka still up to this day, is the eagerness Ennoshita signed up for the space exploration program.

“Can I be honest with you?” he asks.

“Our oxygen reserves will run out earlier if you speak,” Ennoshita replies matter-of-factly. He shifts in his chair, turning his head towards his friend. His usually agitated face is now calm, heavy-lidded eyes cheating the perceiver into thinking that he would fall asleep soon. As their eyes meet, a smile flashes on his face, faint but proud, familiar. It hits Tanaka with the feeling of home. “Not that I mind. Whether we die in thirty minutes or five doesn’t really matter.”

“Why did you decide to join me?”

Ever since he joined the space exploration program, Tanaka has seen the unfriendly face of space. He has completed two missions, each under the sponsorship of the biggest of space conglomerates, Datekou and Seijou, earning himself a steady reputation – and his fashionable, fast, easily maneuverable ship, which he secretly called his princess, survived sun storms and meteor fields and a strange green space fog of acid under his piloting.

But not a black hole.

Black holes are underhanded bitches – despite their extreme mass and gravitational pull, they slip into the canvas of space so seamlessly, they are hard to spot on the machinery of the small explorer ships.

Tanaka lost not one of his piloting buddies to black holes. He swore, upon welcoming Ennoshita aboard, he swore he would not let another black him away too.

He knew the oath he made was almost impossible to keep, just as well as he knew that taking upon the request of the Shiratorizawa corporation might be his most dangerous mission so far. He still accepted it happily. He was controversial like that.

And Ennoshita, for some reason, rolled with it.

“Asking now? Isn’t it a bit too late?” the man asks, his laughter filling the air between them like the sunshine Tanaka has not seen in months.

“I…”

“No, nevermind,” Ennoshita waves, his hand just out of reach, pale and white with veins popping. Tanaka wonders how many kisses he planted on that hand so far – not enough.

Never enough.

“I knew that no matter what I say, I can’t change your mind,” Ennoshita says lightly. “Your mind has always been out here. Even if I managed to tie you down somehow, I knew it would only make you unhappy, dissatisfied.” His hand moves again, grasping thin air. “It was not much of a decision, really.”

Stinging pain in his eyes, Tanaka turns towards the window before them. He sees himself, reflecting in the pale red lights of the pod, face long and terrified. Next to him, just out of reach, is the man who was willing to die for him, with him.

Compared to him, Ennoshita looks so graceful.

With his eyes closed and a smile playing in the corner of his lips, he is the most beautiful man Tanaka has ever laid eyes on.

“I love you too,” he breathes, losing consciousness.

 

☆

 

Ushijima Wakatoshi is famous for a few things, from his incredible piloting skills to his questionable taste for interior design and his absolute devotion towards the color violet – but what makes him really the best among the best, is the tenacity he scans the space after receiving a distress signal.

“I’ve got visual,” Semi says, glancing back to his captain.

“Hook them in,” Ushijima nods, maneuvering the White Eagle towards the escape pod, in a safe distance from the black hole.

“Gotcha!” Tendou exclaims. “Pullin’ them up sweet.”

“Their condition?”

“Alive,” comes Yamagata’s voice from the speakers. “Unconscious, but alive.”


End file.
